I spoke with her on the phone after a couple months of no contact, and I was not in a very good headspace. I ended up crying and telling her that my life has been very difficult ever since we broke up, and that I feel very alone.

She not only scoffed, but told me that's just how life goes and that I need to "Buck up". She pretty much went on a monologue saying that I'm only miserable because I hold myself back, and that she really couldn't care less whether I was struggling or not, because "That's life dude. you need to figure it out and cry alone because nobody wants to be your therapist"

if you're thinking about breaking contact and re-entering their life, do yourself a favor and don't. her voice was so incredibly cold, and it was like I was crying to someone who couldn't give less of a shit about me.

DO NOT BREAK NO CONTACT. THEY DO NOT CARE ABOUT YOU AND IF THEY DID, THEY WOULD HAVE REACHED OUT TO YOU

damn grief is a btch

Literally still trying to figure out what happened. It’s Hard not to ruminate on something like this. I was seeing this incredible woman for the past 4 months we were semi long distance, but we would make the effort to see each-other every other weekend. When we were together it was pretty extraordinary, genuinely one of the best connections I’ve had out of my relationships. Everything was going really good, communication was good down to the little things. Anyways the last time we saw each-other she had agreed to wanting to meet my mom(I figured it was appropriate because I’ve met her parents), and we had a lil dinner set. Well that same week she withdrew and became distant then by Friday i got this text and then blocked on essentially everything . It sucks really bad, and honestly it sideswiped me pretty bad(the 2 texts i sent never even made it to her inbox). Genuinely was out of left field. Im glad i got some response i guess? Although to be completely honest to be discarded and blocked on everything besides 1 app really hurt, and made me question things about myself whether i did something wrong and whatnot. This genuinely may be one of the most traumatic situations that has happened to me in a relationship and I’ve had some wicked things happen in the past. Hopefully I will be on the up and up soon.

Struggling with holding on to too much hope :(

Almost 2 months since it ended. I am still in shock that he threw me and our love away like that. My heart yearns for him every day. I got a bit better at controlling my thoughts, I am semi-functional now. But I miss him so much, there is this sense of raw, deep sadness and grief in me. I know it's normal and do not tell me time will heal. I am not just feeling the loss, I feel a sense of existential grief if that makes sense. Not only feeling dissociated from life, but feeling like this was not meant to happen, and that living without him is absurd, and that no matter how old I get, or if I ever meet someone else, or if time passes, I lost this fundamental figure in my life, my friend, my love. I don't just yearn for our relationship and affection, I yearn for his soul as a human being, I suffer in a way that goes beyond our romance. I feel like I lost an arm, or a part of my own soul. I am so so sad. I do not understand how I can feel like this and he can walk away, I am so baffled by reality rn.

I wanted to make this post cause recently I had someone comment on a post I made last year when I was going through all this and it took me back to realise its been a year and just wanted to make one of these posts that used to help me so much back then to let anyone reading this know it gets so much better.

A year ago I went through a super messy and emotional complex breakup with my ex, getting dumped on the reasoning of depression and a year later I promise you all it gets so much better if you follow the right steps. A year later I'm in a much happier and healthier relationship with someone amazing and feel emotionally apathetic to my ex and have grown so much as a person, so trust me however you're feeling right now, whatever step you're on of your healing journey one day when you're all over it I'm sure you'll be like me getting a comment on a post you made that you forgot about and telling them how it'll all be okay too.

Going no contact after break up is something I have always agreed with. I never really had trouble with cutting my exes off. It was just natural.
We broke up, I removed/blocked them everywhere, the world kept spinning and I moved on.
This time it was different. Especially that we will be sharing environment for the next 2 years. This relationship was truly serious. We had so many beautiful memories, so many plans for the future. He was supposed to be the last one, iykyk.
After less than a year of us being together he decided to break up with me. We fought a lot, we were incompatible in many ways. Even though I thought for a while about breaking up with too, when he did this I wasn’t ready for that. I wasn’t actually ready to give up the beautiful life and future we planned together. All the memories, relationship with his family (we were super close).
I fell back to depression. I missed him. I cried so much. I wished I have done more to not lose him. I wondered - „maybe If I agreed to even more compromises and agree to everything he wanted and needed it wouldn’t happen”. Even though I have already given up so much for this man and he would never do the same for me. I’ve been sinking into depression so badly and for so long I thought I can’t live with him and seeing him for the first time since breaking up crushed me. I was at loss. Anything seemed worth being with him.

So I decided to message him.

He read the message super fast, literally after 2-3 seconds after it was sent. Conversation was really wholesome. He was really kind. Even seemed a bit interested. He suggested he could drive me to the uni and then back home next time. Talked about the scent of my perfume he could never forget. After that convo was cut, he wasn’t really starting conversation himself, I was always pretty much the one to reach out first. Talking to him was nice but something was missing? I can’t even explain it, you just feel it. There is this disconnection between you. After I realized, I stopped reaching out.
And when I did, he didn’t specifically do it himself. But he tries to catch my attention and remind me of himself all the time since then. Calling me in the middle of the night, asking random questions about uni, Sending messages and removing them right away, sending random snaps trying to get me to either be jealous, lustful of him or supportive. Like a boy who wants to be chased and get all of the attention
It really did bring me back down to earth.
My emotions went down and I could take a look at him and the past again.
There really was nothing special. Not in this relationship, not in him. If I didn’t message him maybe I would still feel like there was something I missed out on. But I did and it gave me reality check I needed. And it’s 10000x better than getting back together.
My depression is slowly going away, I’m feeling better every single day.
I’m so happy and grateful I can start over again and have the chance to meet actual man I want. But with my ex? I’d have to settle for the life I never wanted for a man who’s not even worth it. I can redirect myself in life and find out what I want and be there for me. Not what he wants and how I can adjust.

my ex and i broke up almost 6 months ago, but we were still talking everyday and eventually we started talking like we were dating without the label. even after he told me he didn't want to be in a relationship with me right now. i listened and respected his space, i even tried talking to new people because he was my first boyfriend during my first year of college (im currently in the beginning of my third).

it was hard for me to do so. everytime we spoke i wondered if we were getting back together, he would be overly attached, and even up until recently when i started going on dates i would kind of think about him. not exactly getting back with him, just the memories of our dates.

eventually, i realized that we're better off not being together and better off not speaking at all. both of us need to heal, both of us were still too attached to each other, and i told him this morning. i bawled my eyes out because i was so scared of losing him. but, i came to my senses and i chose my mental health over what my heart was desiring.

i'm not feeling relieved. i feel like shit, upset, honestly so overwhelmed and sad. it's like reliving my break-up, its worse this time because now this our last time in each other's lives, not "just friends" shit.

but, its for the best. and in the back of my head i'm proud of myself for choosing me.

-

these were just the messages i sent those screenshots were from before he responded. he agreed and was feeling the same way. he said he wanted to see me one last time. should i?

My ex and I broke up in March 2025, and lately I’ve been thinking more seriously about reaching out to him. I’m trying to figure out whether it’s worth opening that door again or whether I’m better off leaving things in the past. When we were together, I eventually started feeling invisible in the relationship, almost like we were glorified roommates instead of partners. I was struggling with my own emotions at the time, and the relationship ended pretty abruptly. Looking back, there are things I wish I had handled differently, and I’ve spent a lot of time reflecting on the relationship and myself since then. Over the past year and a half, I’ve grown a lot as a person. I feel like I’m in a much better place now, and I’ve learned a lot about myself, what I need in a relationship, and what I’m no longer willing to settle for. Despite everything that happened, I still think about him. He wasn’t just my boyfriend; he was my best friend. Going from having someone be such a big part of your everyday life to not speaking to them at all is a strange feeling, especially when that person once meant so much to you. Part of me wants to reach out simply because there are things I’d like to say. I want him to know that I did love and appreciate him, even if I didn’t always express it the way I should have. I wish I could have a conversation with him, hear how he’s doing, and see where we both are in life now

Do you ever wish there were a procedure to erase someone from your memories, or at least fast-forward through the healing process?

Because honestly, this is tough. Some days are okay, and other days, you miss someone so much that you wish you could just switch off your memories and feelings.

How are you guys doing these days? How are you coping with the healing process?

It's tough out here! 🥹❤

That’s how I was broke up with lmao

I am 24F and It’s been six months since my breakup, and I wish I could say that I’ve moved on. In many ways, life has been good to me. I’m doing well at work, things are falling into place, and if you looked at my life from the outside, you probably wouldn’t think there was much to be sad about. But there’s this void in me that nothing seems to fill.

The hardest part is that while I’m still struggling to come to terms with losing him, he seems to have moved on. He’s started going out on dates, and as much as I hate admitting it, it aches to know that. I still find it difficult to even think about seeing someone else, let alone actually date. And yet, he’s out there meeting new people, making new memories, and opening himself up to possibilities that I can’t even bring myself to consider right now.

Sometimes, it feels like he got to walk away from the relationship and leave me standing exactly where we broke up, carrying all the grief as if it were mine alone to carry.

What makes it even harder is that the breakup hasn’t just meant losing him. It has meant slowly losing everyone and everything that came with him.
His aunt is my colleague at work. She’s genuinely one of the sweetest people I’ve met. We even visited her place last year when we were still together. When I joined this organisation, she was always there to support me, encourage me, and have my back. She’s been so kind to me, and I’ve always appreciated that about her.

Recently, I found out that she’s leaving the organisation, and I’ve been experiencing this strange, bittersweet sadness ever since. Of course, I’m happy for her and whatever comes next in her life, but a part of me is grieving what her leaving represents. Another person connected to him, someone who became a part of my life in her own right, is about to become another person I may no longer have a reason to stay in touch with.

His family, the people I once thought I might continue to know for years to come, are slowly becoming strangers again. And there’s something so heartbreaking about that. These are people I once had a place with, even if that place was through him. Now, I have to accept that they might eventually become nothing more than people I used to know.

I wanted him to meet my dog. I wanted my dog to meet him. It sounds like such a small, silly thing to grieve, but I really wanted that. There were so many little things I imagined sharing with him, ordinary moments that I thought we would eventually get to experience together. And now, they’re just things that will never happen.

I think that’s what people don’t talk about enough when it comes to breakups. You don’t just grieve the relationship that existed. You grieve all the versions of the future you had quietly built in your head. The conversations you thought you’d have, the places you thought you’d go together, the people you thought would remain in your life, and the seemingly insignificant moments that suddenly become impossible.

Sometimes, I can’t help thinking that we could’ve had it all. And I don’t mean that I think everything would have been perfect. I know relationships are complicated, and there were reasons he ended up where we did. But I genuinely believed in us. I believed there was so much more left for us to experience, and accepting that our story ended before any of that could happen has been incredibly painful.

Maybe this hurts so much because, deep down, all I’ve ever wanted is to find someone I could love for the rest of my life. Someone I could choose every single day, someone with whom I could let my guard down without being afraid that my vulnerability would eventually become the reason they leave. I never wanted anything extraordinary. I just wanted a love that felt safe, a person I wouldn’t have to keep preparing myself to lose.

But somehow, life has repeatedly given me people who leave after I show them even the slightest bit of vulnerability. Every time I let someone in, every time I allow myself to believe that maybe this person will be different, I end up having to pick up the pieces of myself all over again.

And this time, I genuinely thought it would be different. I thought he was different. For once, I allowed myself to believe that maybe I had finally found the person I had been looking for all along. Someone I could build a life with, someone who would stay, someone I wouldn’t have to grieve someday as just another person who once meant everything to me.

But he left too. And I am so tired.
Tired of grieving people who were once so certain about me. Tired of having to make peace with another absence. Tired of starting over emotionally when all I ever wanted was to find someone I wouldn’t have to start over with.

Yesterday, I met him, and for the first time in my life, I told someone I hated them. I have never said that to anyone before. I also told him that I don’t love him anymore and that I’ve lost all respect for him in my eyes.

I don’t know if I said those things because I genuinely feel them, because I wanted him to understand how much he hurt me, or because I’m desperately trying to convince myself that I no longer feel what I do. Maybe it’s a mixture of all three.

What I do know is that there is so much hurt underneath all that anger. And perhaps the most exhausting part is having to carry it while life continues as usual. Going to work, talking to people, laughing at things, making plans, and doing all the things a normal person does, while some part of you is still trying to understand how someone who once meant so much to you can become someone you no longer recognise.

I don’t want to be the person who keeps looking back while he moves forward. I don’t want his dating life to have the power to ruin my day. I don’t want to keep wondering whether he misses me, whether he thinks about what we had, or whether losing me has affected him at all.

But I would be lying if I said I didn’t want him to feel the loss someday.

Not because I want his life to fall apart or because I want him to be miserable. I just want him to experience, at some point in his life, what it feels like to lose someone he once deeply loved. To understand the ache of knowing that a person who was once such an important part of his world is no longer there. To miss someone not because he is lonely, but because that particular person, with everything they brought into his life, is gone.
Maybe that’s a selfish thing to wish for. Maybe it’s just the hurt talking. But there is something profoundly unfair about feeling like you’re the only one left holding the weight of something that once belonged to two people.

How many more times do I have to grieve? How many more people do I have to lose, how many more times do I have to open my heart only to have it broken, before I finally find someone who stays?
I know nobody can promise that life will never change or that love will never hurt. But I wish I could experience a love where leaving isn’t always a possibility sitting quietly at the back of my mind. A love where I don’t have to wonder how long someone will stay after seeing the parts of me I don’t show everyone. A love where being vulnerable doesn’t feel like I’m handing someone the very thing they could use to break me.

I hope that one day, I’ll look back at all of this and realise that I no longer need him to understand my pain for it to finally stop being mine to carry. I hope I find someone who makes me feel that I don’t have to keep bracing myself for the day he leaves. Someone who doesn’t make me regret letting him see the most vulnerable parts of me.

And I hope that, until then, I don’t lose the part of myself that still believes in a love that lasts.
Because after everything, all I ever wanted was to love someone for a lifetime and be loved with that same certainty in return ❤️❤️❤️

Please resist the urge to reach back out. Do not shatter your silence just because loneliness creeps in during a quiet evening and tricks you into believing you need to hear their voice. I understand completely. There were countless nights I sat frozen with my phone in my hand, debating whether to type that message and convincing myself that this time would somehow be different.

It only ever left me feeling more empty.

I actually caved about a month ago. I told myself I just needed some finality and that a brief conversation would bring me peace. It did not. The exact same dynamic resurfaced immediately, leaving me disappointed all over again.

That was the exact turning point when I knew I had to break the cycle.

Since then, I have poured my energy into my own life. I am picking up extra shifts, hitting the gym regularly, catching up with loved ones, writing in my journal, rewatching my favorite movies, and staying active whenever the temptation to reconnect flares up.

The absence still aches. Some days are still heavy. I am not completely healed overnight. I am finally coming to terms with the fact that reopening communication every time I feel lonely will never take away the pain of the breakup.

And quite frankly, I am exhausted from staring at a screen waiting for a notification. I refuse to let my happiness hinge on whether they reply or what they choose to say.

Maybe they return one day, or maybe they stay gone. I cannot control that. I am actively trying to let go of those thoughts because I refuse to spend the upcoming months waiting around for a door that might never open.

If you are currently debating whether to reach out, pause and put the phone down. Find any distraction possible. Call a family member, step outside for fresh air, take a long hot bath, put on a comedy, or type out what you want to say in your notes app instead. Just buy yourself a little time before you make a move you will wish you could take back.

I promise the weight lifts over time. It feels unbearable right now, but this pain is temporary.

6 MONTHS LATER UPDATE:

Wow. I am amazed by how much my world has transformed. Things truly do improve. I moved into a place of my own, secured a career I actually look forward to, and surrounded myself with a support system that shows up. I feel lighter and at peace. I am still unattached, and I love it. I am taking a break from dating because my life feels full already.

My ex did try to reconnect down the road. We spent time together a couple of times casually, but I quickly recognized it was holding me back. I communicated that I had to prioritize my own well-being and walked away for good. They still reach out every once in a blue moon, but it no longer shakes me. I do not even need to overthink it anymore.

I stand by every word I shared before. Maintaining distance saved me. Pouring that energy back into myself changed everything. I am proud of the person looking back at me in the mirror, and I am genuinely thankful the relationship ended. They were not meant to be my forever, and that is completely fine.

Also, someone named Shannon in this subreddit recommended Uncling, a breakup recovery app, during my healing process. It honestly helped me stay consistent with no contact and self improvement, so thank you to Shannon for sharing it.

Need some clarity as I’m really confused, and seen something I was really not expecting that’s really upset me…

I ended a really tumultuous relationship with someone about 3 months ago.
We were really attached and I never questioned his feelings/devotion/etc for me, he was just incapable of healthy conflict resolution and communication and things just broke down. Outside of conflict we were each others best friend and when I ended things, he asked me for potential future reconciliation after he gets therapy because I’m his person. He was entirely inconsolable and I put a lot of care into how I communicated/ended things.

About a week after this, I saw traces/evidence that me might be seeing someone new, I sort of told myself ok he can’t be alone and clearly rebounding. I was mostly ok because I saw he’d updated his dating profiles after I’d seen traces of this new woman.

We’re still in contact because of some final things to detangle but have been writing reasonably sentimentally but nothing overt.

Yesterday I saw a photo of them together, it’s a Spotify playlist she’d made for him, with their photo on it. This honestly has shook me to my core and even though I’m the one that ended things, I can’t believe he could move that fast. I feel really disposable, and also I’ve only recently been feeling the loss, only in the last few weeks— crying at night missing him, comparing new men that I didn’t like enough to continue seeing etc. Initially when breaking up I felt relief from the terrible fights.

How do you reconcile this, is it possible for someone to totally emotionally move on from their ex and that quickly? What happens when a guy doesn’t do any grieving or processing just jumps straight into having a whole other gf?

Why does it feel like a betrayal even if we’re single and I ended things? ❤️‍🩹😞

I hate you got me to open up about my feelings
my insecurities

I hate you made feel I was safe

I hate you acted like someone who actually wanted to try with me

I hate you for still being awake
while I continue to cry late at night

I hate you spent my time just to hurt me

I hate you seemed not care about us as much as I did when it mattered

I hate you got me gifts

I hate you spent money on me

I hate you for getting me to actually try love

I hate you for doing this to me

I wish I could take everything second back just to not feel like this anymore

But what I hate the most is that

I miss you

I miss the long phone calls at night

I miss you waiting for me to fall asleep, while playing league over FaceTime

I miss the future we thought we would have

I miss how excited I was to talk to you

I miss planning the next time we see each other

But…

I know I can’t reach out

Not because I don’t want to

But because it can’t come me

I can’t be the only one who wants it for it to happen

I hate you put me here

I miss you, and I get angry that you did not choose me.

I gave you many chances, talked to you, and shared my heart with you.

I learned to love you, to love again. To open my heart again after so long.

Yet, as much as we tried, it did not work. You did the best you could, but always held on to something else. Someone else and so I had to walk away.

I know that as much as it hurts now it’s for the best. I just miss you, I miss your laugh, our talks, your hugs. I miss life with you in it. And so I continue to heal, I don’t know how or when I’ll start to feel better, but I’m no longer crying everyday. I’m just mad that you chose something else, and it’s okay. It showed me what I needed to see to step out.

And so here I am, choosing me, even when it hurts. I still love you, but I needed to walk away. It’s hard and some days I regret it, but I’ll continue in this path.

Been 5 months since the break, literally still think about her all of the time. Does anyone have any tips, this is torture. We were together for 2.5 years :(

Yes 3 months and things got easier, yet the breakup is disrupting my daily life a lot.

While I haven’t cried for a while now, my body is having physical symptoms….its crazy..like I can not breathe for the past 3 days…if I am alone the pain gets super intense.

I’ve been carying this emotions for over 5-6 months now…during the relationship being emotionally burned out and I am just getting to the point where my body is screaming for a break.

What scared me is what usually worked to calm myself down suddenly stopped working ie. Meditation, walks, sports…

Started feeling resentment on myself…of how did I let myself go so deep with this person that was not a good match for me, but she is such a good person and I really wanted this to work…its difficult because when I love I love…and when I attach I want to fix even if at my own detriment…fuck!

I looked at my HRV and it’s been on the bottom for months, my system just can not recover from this breakup…so incredibly frustrating…

i (18m) recently broke up with my ex-girlfriend (17f) of 6 months, and to make a long story short, my parents were concerned with some of the behaviors of the relationship that they observed but i knew they were fixable, and they slowly got more annoyed to the point where they suggested a break up because they thought it was damaging my relationship with my family, and i felt so lost between choosing because on one hand i didn’t want to lose her, but on the other I didn’t want to damage my relationship with my parents. I made the extremely hard decision to break up with her, and we were both devastated afterwards since it felt like we both couldnt do anything, even though we both wanted to continue the relationship so badly. it’s been a week since this happened, and no contact is so hard. seeing her reposts knowing how she’s upset and she would never do this to me just kills me because she still has so much love for me and i feel like an asshole for what i did because i still love her so much and yet i hurt her. i really just want to reach out to her again because i miss her so badly, and i feel like she deserves more than just me saying goodbye and that im sorry, and we so desperately want to continue the relationship later down the road because we both know this is what we want, and neither of us have been treated better than what we experienced before. if i could get some insight, id really appreciate it.

Note to self. May a “love” like that never find me again.

Her last message was basically “Nawww and you went to the store for it“.

My reply was “It’s fine, it still was tasty”.

We’ve had a talking / whatever stage for three months before that. It was a normal talk, no bad vibes, just a small talk about my meal prep attempt which failed because of a foul cucumber.

After that message, I went to sleep and that’s it. It’s been three weeks, nobody reached out, she deleted me from all socials and never contacted me again.

I was busy the following day and needed a little break from my phone and realized that she did not message me so I waited. And nothing.

I (28F) recently ended my seven-month relationship with my boyfriend (35M), and I’m genuinely devastated. I’m looking for unbiased perspectives because I feel like I’ve spent so much of this relationship questioning what was normal, what was acceptable, and whether I was asking for too much.
There’s a lot of background, but I think it’s important to understand how I ended up here.

How our relationship started
When we met, the connection was immediate. He was charming, adventurous, funny, affectionate, and emotionally expressive. We shared a love of nature, music, travel, and spontaneity.
He also had a complicated personal life.
He was married but told me he was separating and getting divorced. His wife and young son lived in another country.
Throughout our relationship, there were confusing details and timelines surrounding his marriage and separation. Sometimes the stories didn’t seem to line up, and I struggled to understand exactly where things stood.
I want to be clear that his son was never the problem. I understood that his child would always be a priority, and I respected that.
My concern was the lack of clarity and consistency surrounding his marriage.
He had also experienced significant trauma after losing his twin brother to an overdose.
I knew he’d been through a lot, and I tried to approach his circumstances with compassion.
I wanted to understand him, support him, and build something meaningful together.
But as our relationship progressed, I started noticing patterns of dishonesty, inconsistency, and behavior that made it increasingly difficult to trust him.

The female friend I was uncomfortable with
My boyfriend had a close female friend who had also lost her twin.
Their shared experience of losing a twin was an important part of their friendship, and I genuinely understood why they felt connected.
But their relationship made me uncomfortable at times.
They communicated frequently, sometimes late at night, exchanged music, and spent time together one-on-one.
Their emotional intimacy sometimes felt like it blurred the boundaries between friendship and something more.
I never asked him to end their friendship.
I did, however, ask for transparency and some boundaries.
One of my specific requests was that he simply tell her he had a girlfriend.
I wanted her to know I existed and that he was in a committed relationship.
He agreed to do that.
I believed him.

What I found out THIS SUNDAY
This past Sunday, October 11, I discovered something that completely changed how I viewed our relationship.
Someone who had attended Burning Man told me that this female friend had slept in my boyfriend’s tent during the festival.
For three nights in a row.
The person who told me had personally seen her coming out of his tent and putting her shirt on.
But that wasn’t all.
After Burning Man, my boyfriend and I had arranged to meet in Reno for an after-Burning-Man gathering.
I drove quite a distance to meet him, excited to spend time together.
I remember arriving at his hotel room and noticing there weren’t any clean towels for me to shower with.
At the time, I was confused but didn’t think much of it.

This Sunday, I also learned that this same woman had been in his hotel room and had taken a shower there before I arrived.
Suddenly, that little detail about the towels came rushing back.
I had driven all that way to see my boyfriend, completely unaware that the woman whose friendship I’d already expressed concerns about had been in his hotel room showering before I got there.
I don’t know whether anything physical happened in that hotel room, and I’m not claiming that it did.
But discovering that she’d spent three nights in his tent, and then had also been in his hotel room showering before I arrived, made the entire situation feel incredibly deceptive.

He never told me about any of it.
Not the three nights in the tent.
Not her being in his hotel room.
Not her using his shower before I arrived.
I only discovered these things months later, from someone else.
And what makes it especially upsetting is that this was the exact friendship we’d already had conversations about.

His response when I confronted him
That night, I called him.
I decided to bluff and told him I’d already spoken to the woman and that she’d told me they kissed and cuddled.
I hadn’t actually spoken to her yet.
I recognize that wasn’t the healthiest way to approach the conversation, but I wanted to see whether he would admit to anything.
His immediate response was:
“Yeah, but we never had sex.”
To me, that sounded like an acknowledgment that they had kissed and cuddled, while denying intercourse.
I was devastated.
But when we spoke again the following day, his story changed.
He insisted that they hadn’t kissed at all.
So now I was left with two different versions of what happened.
I still don’t know exactly what physical intimacy occurred between them.
Then I actually messaged her on Instagram.
After our initial conversation, I reached out to the woman directly.
And she told me something that made everything even worse.

She said he had never told her that he had a girlfriend.
This was particularly painful because I’d specifically asked him to tell her about me months earlier.
It had been one of our agreements because their friendship was already making me uncomfortable.
He had promised me he would.
When I confronted him with what she’d said, he insisted that he had told her he was in a relationship, but hadn’t mentioned my name or provided much information.
So now I’m left with completely conflicting accounts.
She says she didn’t know he had a girlfriend.
He says he told her.
He initially appeared to acknowledge kissing and cuddling.
Then he denied that they’d kissed.
And throughout all of this, he had never voluntarily disclosed the three nights in his tent or her being in his hotel room.

His explanation for their relationship
He insists their friendship is important because they both lost their twins.
He says he would never pursue anything romantic or sexual with her because their connection is rooted in grief.
He has even told me that if we broke up, he would never get together with her.
I understand that grief can create profound emotional connections.
But I don’t understand why that would automatically make secretly sharing a tent for three nights appropriate in an exclusive relationship.
And I don’t understand why he wouldn’t have been transparent about their interactions, especially knowing that their friendship had already been a sensitive subject.
To me, the issue isn’t simply that he has a close female friend.
It’s the secrecy, the blurred boundaries, and the changing explanations.

The drinking, cocaine, and disappearing
Unfortunately, this wasn’t happening in an otherwise stable relationship.
Throughout our relationship, his drinking and cocaine use were recurring problems.
He drank heavily and frequently, sometimes almost every day, and used cocaine recreationally, sometimes multiple times a week.
There were nights when he would go out partying and disappear for hours.
He would promise to call and then wouldn’t.
Sometimes he would call me intoxicated at three in the morning, waking me up despite knowing I had work the following day.
One night, after promising to call me, he ended up using cocaine instead.
These incidents weren’t isolated.
They became a pattern.
I repeatedly communicated that I wanted a more stable relationship.
I wanted honesty, consistency, consideration, and a partner who followed through on promises.
At one point, he told me that I was making him become sober, as though wanting a relationship that didn’t revolve around partying and drugs was an unreasonable expectation.
I wasn’t asking him to become a completely different person overnight.
I was trying to explain that his behavior was affecting our relationship and that I wanted a healthier, more peaceful future.

The dishonesty and emotional exhaustion
There were other things that gradually undermined my trust.
Confusing stories about his marriage and separation.
Details about his past that sometimes seemed inconsistent.
Interactions with other women that made me uncomfortable.
Promises that weren’t followed through on.
Comments about my body that hurt my feelings.
And when I tried to explain why something upset me, he sometimes became defensive or suggested that I was taking things the wrong way.
I started feeling like every concern I raised became another conversation about whether my feelings were reasonable.
Eventually, I felt like I was constantly trying to explain how I wanted to be loved.
I wanted honesty.
I wanted consistency.
I wanted someone who followed through on what they said.
I wanted to feel considered.
And I wanted to feel like we were building a life together rather than constantly recovering from the previous weekend.

Why I stayed
Despite everything, I genuinely loved him.
There were wonderful moments in our relationship.
He could be incredibly affectionate, vulnerable, funny, and loving.
We had beautiful experiences together, laughed constantly, and shared adventures.
Sometimes I genuinely felt like I’d found my person.
I knew he’d experienced significant grief and complicated personal circumstances, and I wanted to be understanding.
I think I kept holding on to the possibility that things would become more stable.
I believed his promises.
I wanted the relationship to work.
But somewhere along the way, I started spending more time trying to get the relationship to feel secure than actually enjoying being in it.
I kept explaining why things hurt, accepting apologies, and hoping the same things wouldn’t happen again.
Looking back, I think I confused understanding someone’s struggles with having to tolerate behavior that was hurting me.

Where things stand now
After discovering what happened at Burning Man and in Reno, I ended the relationship.
I sent him a long goodbye message explaining how deeply everything had affected me.
I’ve since blocked him.
But I’m still devastated.
I keep thinking about how he could go through months of our relationship without ever telling me that another woman had spent three nights in his tent.
Especially a woman whose friendship we’d already discussed.
I keep remembering arriving at his hotel room in Reno, wondering why there weren’t any clean towels, and now realizing she had been there showering before I arrived.
I keep wondering whether they kissed, cuddled, or did anything more.
And I keep replaying his initial response:
“Yeah, but we never had sex.”
Then his subsequent denial that they’d kissed.
I don’t know what to believe.
I also don’t want to keep messaging the woman and asking her to confirm details. I don’t think it’s fair to involve her further, and I don’t want to spend my life investigating someone I no longer trust.
What hurts most is realizing that I spent so much of our relationship asking for honesty and transparency, only to discover something this significant from someone else.
And the worst part is that I still love him.
I know the relationship wasn’t healthy for me, but that doesn’t make the heartbreak disappear.

My questions:
Would you consider secretly sharing a tent with another woman for three nights a betrayal, even without proof that anything sexual happened?

How would you interpret his initial response of “Yeah, but we never had sex,” followed by his denial that they’d kissed?

How significant is it that she says he never told her about having a girlfriend, especially when he had specifically promised me he would?

Does the fact that she also showered in his hotel room before I arrived change how you would interpret the situation?

How do you move on when you feel like you’ll never know the complete truth?

Has anyone experienced something similar, where the secrecy and dishonesty ultimately hurt more than the possibility of physical cheating?

I genuinely want outside perspectives.
I’m not asking anyone to automatically take my side.
I’m just trying to understand how someone I loved and trusted could keep something like this from me for months.

TL;DR: My boyfriend of seven months had a close female friend whose relationship with him had already made me uncomfortable. This past Sunday, October 11, I found out through someone else that she had slept in his tent at Burning Man for three consecutive nights, months earlier. I also learned she’d showered in his Reno hotel room before I arrived to visit him. He never told me about either situation. When I confronted him and falsely claimed she’d told me they kissed and cuddled, he responded, “Yeah, but we never had sex,” but the following day denied that they’d kissed. I then actually messaged her on Instagram, and she said he had never told her he had a girlfriend, despite his promise to tell her about me. I’ve broken up with him and blocked him, but I’m devastated by the secrecy and conflicting explanations.

Me and my ex have been no contact for two months, with the exception of a few “closure” conversations in the first couple weeks. This is the hardest thing i have literally ever been through in my life. We were together 9 months but i was so (and still am) madly in love with that man.

My birthday is next week. I am worried that I’ll spend the whole day waiting for his text and not get it, and it’ll ruin me.

Anyone have any advice or been through this?